As described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,620,079 (incorporated herein by reference) a coin counter discriminator may be provided which receives and counts a plurality of coins and outputs a voucher, i.e. an output which itself has a value, related to the value of the an arbitrary number of multi-denominated counted coins, and which may be redeemed or exchanged for such value. In at least one application of a coin counter/discriminator, a number of such discriminators are positioned at retail locations and are configured to facilitate use by untrained users, particularly, ordinary untrained customers (as opposed to, e.g., employees) of the retail locations. Such users typically bring jars or other containers having a plurality of coins to the machine and dump the coins into a coin receiving region or area, in a random, jumbled mass, i.e. in a an unoriented fashion, with the coins typically being of a plurality of different denominations, and often including non-coin items, (paper items, lint, keys, screws, washers and the like) and/or foreign or other non-acceptable or undesirable coins. The machine is configured to discriminate and/or separate acceptable or desirable coins from other objects and also to discriminate one denomination of coin from another. The acceptable coins are counted, preferably by denomination, and a total of acceptable coins or a total value of acceptable coins is determined in this manner. The acceptable coins are retained, e.g. in a bin or bag within the discriminator and non-coin objects, unacceptable coins or undiscriminable objects are treated as waste and/or returned to the user.
Although there is no theoretical reason why such a coin discriminator could not be configured to output government-issued paper currency ("cash") in response to at least some of the counted and retained acceptable coins, in at least one embodiment it is preferred to output a voucher which includes written and/or encoded indicia which indicates, at least indirectly, information including the value which the voucher has. The value of the voucher is not necessarily equal to the "face value" of the counted acceptable coins. In one embodiment, the value of the voucher will be equal to the value of the counted coins minus a fee charged for the counting service. The fee may be calculated in a number of fashions such as a flat fee, a fee based on the number of coins counted, a fee which takes into consideration the types or denominations of the coins counted, a fee which is a percentage of the value or a weighted percentage based on type or denomination of coins, and the like. It would also be possible to provide a configuration in which the value of the voucher exceeded the face value of the counted coins e.g. as a promotion to encourage use of the machine for a limited period or to take into account coins which have an actual value exceeding the face value (e.g. recognized rare or otherwise valuable coins) and the like.
Although, in at least one configuration, a voucher is in the form of a paper slip printed with certain information, as described more fully below, the voucher may also take other forms including digital or electronic codes recorded on or transferred to a magnetic card, a smart card, transferred to a bank account or other account, e.g. over a preferably encrypted or otherwise secure telephone or other communication link, transferred to a computer such as a retail location "back room" computer or other computer (e.g. to credit a user's account or provide a credit against purchases and the like).
After the voucher is output, in at least some systems a user will use or obtain the value of the voucher e.g. by redeeming the voucher. It is anticipated that, typically, a user such as a retail customer will present the voucher to a retail cashier (e.g. the cashier at a grocery store checkout location), often as part of a purchase transaction, and the retail cashier will redeem the voucher by paying the voucher in cash or by providing a credit for the amount of the voucher against purchases made by the customer.
In this regard, it can be seen that the voucher itself is treated as having value and accordingly, there is a potential for unscrupulous individuals to obtain or devise a counterfeit, duplicate or altered voucher in order to obtain value to which they are not entitled. For example, some individuals may attempt to make one or more photocopies, or otherwise duplicate a voucher and present it for redemption. Some individuals may attempt to counterfeit an entire voucher, such as by drafting or composing an image of a voucher. Some individuals may alter a legitimate voucher (or an image of a legitimate voucher) e.g. changing the amount or value indicated or encoded on or in the voucher. Accordingly, it would be useful to provide a system which assists in detecting duplicate, counterfeit or altered vouchers.
In a number of situations, it is desired to provide for relatively rapid redemption or other processing of presented vouchers, in order to avoid customer ill will or excessive employee time that could be the result of excessively-long voucher processing. In a number of situations, voucher processing is facilitated with the use of store checkout equipment such as checkout (point-of-sale or "POS") computers, scanners and the like. However, modifications of such equipment to provide for additional functions can involve additional programming time, can increase execution or processing time, can impose extra computing burden on processors in such systems and may require linking the POS system to an external system, thus involving additional hardware and requiring extensing programming and/or system configuration. Accordingly, it would be advantageous to provide a system for detecting duplicate, counterfeit, or alternate vouchers which can achieve rapid voucher processing without undue burden on existing computer, scanning or other equipment at retail locations.
In many retail locations, checkout equipment includes the capability of bar code scanning e.g. for identifying merchandise. Typically, the associated software is configured to recognize bar codes according to a standard bar code system such as a system promulgated by the Uniform Code Council Inc. of Dayton, Ohio. Accordingly, it would be useful to provide a system for detecting counterfeit, duplicate or altered vouchers which was at least partially (preferably, fully) compatible with a standard bar code system.